TERESA HERRERA TROPHY

Teresa Margarita Herrera y Posada was born in A Coruña on 10 November 1712. She was known as “Teresa dos demos” (Teresa of the demons in Galician), as she was considered to be a “meiga” (an evil witch in Galician). She had a very hard life. When her mother was widowed and left with ten children (seven of them would die young), she abandoned her home at an early age, dedicating the rest of her life to help the underprivileged. In 1789, Teresa Herrera donated her property to the congregation of Our Lady of Sorrows to carry out her lifelong dream of founding a charity hospital in the city; its first stone was laid two years later.

Thanks to this commendable mission, and with the help of the Local Charity Board, a football event was created in 1946 that sought to channel social solidarity in a time of hardship. The idea was to provide economic relief to those that needed it the most through a great football tournament; a brilliant idea for its time and a precedent in the economic maximization of this sport. The philanthropic spirit of the new tournament could not have had a better name than the historic benefactress of A Coruña. The first match was held on 31 July and the result was Sevilla 3 - Athletic 2.

But the binomial Teresa Herrera/A Coruña makes no sense unless it is completed with its third part, RC Deportivo. Although at first the tournament rules prohibited the participation of the Club from A Coruña, with the intention of safeguarding the tournament's originality, as time went by, the complete opposite thing happened, to the point that the Branquiazuis have become the main attraction of this competition. Deportivo was the team that had participated the most by the Teresa Herrera's 45th edition. There has always been an important conflict in the city, and mainly at the end of the 80s, where some people thought that it was more important to have top teams participating, and others that believed Deportivo's participation was essential. A debate which, at the end of the day, one can see the high level that is traditionally required for this competition.

However, it is a fact that Teresa Herrera’s organisation has always had Deportivo at hand, including those crucial moments, like in September 1962 when the tournament was still not completely arranged, and they had to urgently resort to the Branquiazul Club to play against Benfica in order not to cancel the tournament. Funnily enough, that improvised edition on September the 9th, became one of the Trophy’s most legendary matches in which Eusebio’s Benfica (who had won the European Champion Clubs' Cup four months earlier), were defeated by Montalvo, Veloso, Ruíz and Jaime Blanco’s goals (4-2).

70 different teams have competed in the Teresa Herrera, thus, making it a genuine international milestone of summer football in which teams proudly come just to participate. Spain, Brazil, France, the United Kingdom, Netherlands, Portugal, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Czech Republic, Uruguay, Romania, Russia, Ukraine, Serbia, Argentina, Austria, Belgium, Sweden, Switzerland and Mexico are the countries that make up the history of this Impressionist painting of world football that is Teresa Herrera.

The Teresa Herrera is custodian of Galicia's most ancient cultural traditions. A magical pairing between Coruña’s jewellers and Compostela’s silversmiths has crystallised the Trophy’s history. None of the oldest official trophies can boast of so many original features. In fact, even in materialistic times, making this precious trophy every year, and for a friendly, can seem like an extravagance. However not in this case; because the Teresa Herrera Trophy not only forms part of the city’s history, it is also the living essence of it and there lies the key to its longevity.

The 50th edition’s trophy is without a doubt a one-off masterpiece. It took 2,400 hours, 7.4 kilos of gold and 32.7 of silver to make a spectacular hybrid of the two traditions of the Teresa Herrera, the trophies, the most valuable one was kept until the 24th edition, and the towers from that edition onwards. It is said that in a hypothetical auction, the trophy would go for about a million euros.

In any case, this is just talk, because the value of the Teresa Herrera Trophy is incalculable. As universal culture heritage, it speaks for itself and deserves a place of honour among the finest in the Louvre, Hermitage or British Museum. The Teresa Herrera is something Galicia can be proud of, a luxury for A Coruña and, after seventy two editions it has become much more than a work of art.